1988] 
Peeters & Crozier — cast and reproduction 
285 
Workers also can reproduce 
The queen caste has been lost in several ponerine ants, and mated 
workers lay all the eggs (Peeters 1987). Reproductive differentiation 
in queenless ants is analogous to that in primitively-eusocial wasps 
and bees since it occurs in the adult stage. A major difference how- 
ever is that queenless ponerine colonies consist exclusively of 
members of the worker caste, while primitively-eusocial colonies 
consist of undifferentiated females. 
Problems in terminology arise when describing individuals from 
the same morphological caste that perform different roles. Mated 
ponerine workers are the functional reproductives in a colony, but if 
they are designated as “queens” (e.g. Holldobler and Bartz 1985) 
their developmental origin is disguised. They clearly differ from 
members of the queen caste, because they cannot start new colonies 
independently, and they have a lower egg-laying rate as a result of 
simpler ovaries (Peeters and Crewe 1985). Furthermore, in Rhyti- 
doponera confusa, colonies can have either one queen or several 
gamergates, which is a major biological difference (Ward 1983). A 
description specifying both phenotype and role is thus sometimes 
necessary, for example “unmated workers laying diploid eggs” (in 
the myrmicine Pristomyrmex pungens; Itow et al. 1984), or “mated 
laying workers”. The latter have been termed “gamergates” partly 
for convenience, and partly to highlight this eusocial alternative and 
distinguish them from wingless queens with an external worker 
appearance (= ergatoid) (Peeters and Crewe 1985). 
Buschinger ’s proposed nomenclature 
Buschinger (1987 and earlier publications) also recognized that 
there is a need for a combination of structural and functional terms 
to describe the members of non-orthodox ant societies. Buschinger 
has suggested that “queen” and “worker” take on a strictly func- 
tional meaning (reproductive or not), and that new terms be 
adopted to describe morphology in all Hymenoptera. For example, 
mated egg-laying workers (“gamergates”) would be called “ergato- 
morphic queens”, and infertile queens would be “gynomorphic 
workers”. It is crucial to note that Buschinger (pers. comm.) under- 
stands these new terms to refer to external morphology only; this 
stems from the very precise meaning of the German word “Mor- 
phologic”. Since characters such as ovariole number or presence of 
